


Tears

by serenesavagery (windrunnerdreamer)



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender, 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia
Genre: Abuse, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Child Abuse, Crossover, Emotional, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Gen, Hinted anyway, Hurt Todoroki Shouto, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Male Friendship, Minor Midoriya Izuku/Todoroki Shouto, Pre-Slash, Protective Zuko (Avatar), Zuko is an Awkward Turtleduck, but he's a lot more emotionally aware thanks to one firelord zuko, it takes a few steps yes, tododeku is pre slash, todoroki is not as emotionally constipated as you think
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-03
Updated: 2020-09-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:33:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26233477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/windrunnerdreamer/pseuds/serenesavagery
Summary: The Avatar's spirit, always tries. It always tries to heal.Though it isn't always obvious, as Zuko accidentally gets briefly transported to a seemingly futuristic world, but there is something he recognizes.A boy who's been hurt.
Relationships: Midoriya Izuku & Todoroki Shouto, Midoriya Izuku/Todoroki Shouto, Todoroki Shouto & Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 17
Kudos: 469





	Tears

**Author's Note:**

> this is very self indulgent and hastily written ok

Zuko called bullshit on the Avatar being the world's savior because otherwise-

_Otherwise-_

Why the _hell_ would it transport him to a brown room and knock him out while at it?

Zuko groaned a little, rubbing his forehead as he looked around- windows, a modernistic layout, a boy in a blue shirt, a plant-

A boy in a blue shirt. Who was staring at him like he had lost his marbles. To be fair, Zuko did lose his marbles. 

That wasn't what caught his eyes though. 

It was the white bandage over his left eye that completely obscured it. That, was what caught Zuko's eye, and his breath hitched, _because this boy couldn't be older than ten, who did this to him, what happened to him-_

Zuko felt sick and nauseous to his core. 

"Who are you?" The boy asked in a trembling voice, and Zuko's heart ached at how young this boy, this child sounded. 

"I'm...where am I?" Zuko asked, voice soft and gentle. 

The boy _flinched_ at his tone, in a way that was so familiar that it caused Zuko to inhale sharply. 

"Answer me first." The boy said, his voice shaking. 

Zuko swallowed- recognizing that _bite_ this boy forced into his words, to make himself seem stronger and his heart ached once more. 

"My name is Zuko." Zuko said simply, hugging his knees. 

The boy bit his tongue but seemed satisfied. His hair was odd- split evenly, white on one side and red on the other. His right eye was grey, and he seemed so small. So fragile. 

This boy was younger than Zuko had been. Instinctively, his hand went to his own scar, and the boy flinched again at the sight. Zuko swallowed, and retraced his hand to his left knee. 

"I'm To- Shouto." The boy said, in a small voice. 

Zuko raised an eyebrow but did not comment. He swallowed- it seemed similar to how Zuko had stopped himself from calling himself the prince. 

Who was this boy?

"Hi." Zuko says, smiling to put the boy at ease. 

It didn't seem to work, disappointingly enough. Zuko tried not to let it affect him too much. 

"And you're in my house." The boy added after a while, saying the last two words coldly. 

Zuko but on his lip. 

_What happened to him?_

"How old are you?" Zuko asked, worrying his lip and his mind. 

Shouto narrowed his eye, but it was still achingly vulnerable, as he turned away. "Five." He said in a small voice.

Zuko couldn't hold back the gasp at that word.

 _Five? Five? This kid was_ five _? He was five years old and somebody was cruel enough to- to-_

At least _his_ father had waited for him to assert himself, not that what he did had been correct anyway, but-

Who would want to do this to a five year old? 

Worse, if Shouto's _family,_ someone from this boy's family did this to him-

What the fuck?

Shouto now turned to look at him, suspicious at his gasp. "What?"

Zuko pursed his lips, licking them as he considered how to ask his question. He _knew_ how touchy he had been about his own scar, back when it had been freshly formed, back when he couldn't see a damn thing, back when it had _hurt_ so much-

Back when all he wanted to do was scream.

Zuko swallowed. He wouldn't ask this boy about his scar. "Nothing. You seemed older." Zuko says softly, facing Shouto.

Shouto raised a white eyebrow. "Don't be patronizing." He said, though he stumbled over that last word in a painfully childish way, reminding Zuko all the more of how _young_ this boy was.

"I'm not, really. You're only five though, you're still a kid." Zuko let out, before cringing at how wrongly worded _that_ was.

Well, at least he didn't need anybody's advice to figure _that_ was- if the way Shouto clenched his fist was any indication.

"Hold on, hold on, that's not what I meant!" Zuko said, raising his hands.

"Quiet! If you want to tell me something, you have to know this, no one can know you're here!" Shouto hissed, and Zuko widened his eyes. 

_Be quiet. Don't anger him, Zuzu- you were lucky to be born after all. Your existence makes him_ sick, Azula's voice sang tauntingly in his brain, and Zuko's heart squirmed.

Zuko took a deep breath. It had only been after talking to Aang and the others that he even grew the confidence to talk loudly at all, and...Fine. Fine, he shouldn't have to endanger Shouto after all. 

"What did you mean?" Shouto asked, folding his arms as his eye fixated on Zuko's scar. 

Zuko noticed it, and licked his lips again, sighing as he worried them. He lowered his voice to a whisper, before talking. 

"I meant...Shouto, you're just five. You don't have to," Zuko swallowed, surprised at how easily the words came to him. "You don't have to _try_ to look older, you know." Feeling bold, Zuko rushed on. "And..." his voice softened. "I don't know who did that to you," he didn't point at the scar, but the flicker of his gaze more than caught Shouto's attention. "But what happened to you? That was _wrong_. Nothing is worth getting scarred at all. Trust me." Zuko said, inhaling.

He then ran a hand through his hair, sighing. "What I meant was, you can cry. You can get angry because _that_ happened to you. Because it's wrong. Whatever you did, never warrants something that severe."

"You don't know what you're talking about." Shouto hisses, curling up into himself, defensive as his little body shakes tremulously. 

Zuko can relate. Hearing it from Aang and Sokka seemed _too_ good to be true for him- if that scar wasn't _his_ fault, then whose? His father's? Or so was the general consensus in Zuko's brain at the time. But...

He had friends. Family.

This kid seemed all alone.

"Don't I?" Zuko asks rhetorically, hand on his own scar. 

Shouto flinches. But Zuko holds his stare- whatever he came here for, however he may try to go back, he _had_ to help this boy. 

He wouldn't let anyone suffer what he had. 

"I-" Shouto gulps, looking around. "My mom..."

Zuko sucks in a harsh breath, but decides not to interrupt. Shouto doesn't sound like he hates her.

"My mom always tried to keep me safe from my d-d-dad...but he'd beat her up, every time she said I was just a kid-"

Zuko felt _sick_. Were fathers supposed to be this shitty? 

Of course, having met Hakoda, he _knows_ this is not the case but what on earth would merit-

"Why did she have to keep you safe from your dad?" Zuko asks gently.

Shouto sniffs, rubbing his eye with a knuckle. "I'm the only one in my family who has both an ice and a fire quirk. My dad wants me to use that to beat All Might, the No. 1 Hero. He's mean, and he always beats up my mom. And one day- my mom, my mom saw me and she thought- she thought I was my dad...so she threw a boiling kettle at me." He says, voice trembling.

Zuko tries to make sense of what this kid's saying- he nearly forgot he got transported somewhere strange after all, and he tries to collect his thoughts in the midst of the sheer _anger_ he feels towards Shouto's father. 

So having a quirk meant power. Something like bending. All Might was clearly somebody important and _whoa-_ training a five year old so that he could beat somebody clearly a lot more experienced than this kid ever _would_ be? 

What the fuck? Zuko has half a mind to demand where the hell Shouto's dad is and burn him to a crisp. 

And his mom......Zuko can only imagine how damaged she must be, to-

 _Calm down, Zuko,_ Iroh's voice fills his mind, and Zuko breathes. 

He can't go the long way for this kid. He has to listen to him. 

"That's wrong of him, your dad. You're just five. What do _you_ wanna do, Shouto?" Zuko asks, trying to smile to put him at ease. 

Shouto stares at him, grey eye blinking rather comically. 

"I wanna..." Shouto looks down, little fists curled and clenched on his knees. "I wanna be a hero. But not like Dad. I wanna be like All Might." 

Zuko grins. "That's a good way to sock it to your dad, kiddo. Trust me."

Zuko would know. Capture the Avatar, his father said. How his father had rolled in his grave (well, metaphorical grave anyway) when knowing that Zuko actually _befriended_ the Avatar. 

This, was a good kid, Zuko decided.

Shouto looks up to him, wonder in his eye, and doesn't it warm Zuko to know that that expression on the boy's face was _right_. "Really?"

Zuko winks. "Really." 

Shouto, for the first time since Zuko's met him, smiles. "Okay!" 

"You keep smiling like that, and you'll feel better, even when the world seems terrible. You also need to know when to cry and when something bad's happening, okay?" Zuko murmurs, and Shouto nods, eye gleaming with happy tears.

"Okay! Thank you, Big Brother Zuko!" Shouto says happily, and Zuko's heart _warms_ at hearing the words he could have heard from Azula- but he won't go there for now. He's happy he's managed to help this kid out, somehow. 

Zuko then finds the blue light he saw before coming here now enveloping him once more, and just like that, he knows it's time to leave.

"Wait, what's happening?" Shouto asks, bewildered.

Zuko smiles. "I think I have to go back where I came from."

"Can't I see you again?" Shouto asks, lip quivering. 

Zuko smiles, and gets up, ruffling Shouto's hair, as tears pool in the little boy's eye. "Maybe. Maybe not. Just remember what I said, okay?"

"But I don't want you to leave!" Shouto whispers loudly, shaking as he clings on to Zuko's leg. 

Zuko hugs him, even as Shouto sobs into his leg, before pulling back and lowering down to Shouto's height.

"Shouto?"

"Yeah?" Shouto asks, voice wobbly as he's sniffing.

"I'll always be here, as long as you remember everything I've told you, okay?" Zuko murmurs, cupping Shouto's cheeks before poking at his chest.

"H-Here?" Shouto asks, eye wide with wonder, looking down where to Zuko's finger is. 

"Always." Zuko promises, even if he knows he's spouting bull, as Sokka says. Shouto's mouth forms a little 'o' of wonder and he smiles.

"That's okay!" Shouto says, smiling cheerily. 

He does know, somehow. And the sight of Shouto's smile is a reassuring memory.

* * *

**_ Eleven years later: _ **

"Heroes don't need to cry!" Midoriya wobbles out unsteadily, stuffing his face with rice. 

Shouto thinks. 

Instinctively, Zuko flashes to his mind again, and though he's never seen that strange teenager once more, disappointingly enough, Shouto's never forgotten _his_ words, though he had forgotten his mother's.

_What I meant was, you can cry. You can get angry because that happened to you. Because it's wrong._

"Crying isn't wrong, Midoriya." Shouto says softly, his thoughts assembling themselves to form something. 

Midoriya looks at him, eyes wide. Shouto faces him, clearing his throat.

"If...If something wrong's happened to you, or if you just _feel_ like it, you _should_ cry. Crying isn't a weakness. It never is. I think, no, _know_ that heroes need to cry too." Shouto says, voice soft as he implores to anything that'll listen to him, that Midoriya would listen, that his friend's troubles would no longer bear down on him that heavily.

Midoriya's breath hitches. "T-Todoroki-kun-"

"I don't know how people suddenly decided that crying is weak, but it isn't. If you don't cry, how else will you express your fears, your worries so that they don't bear down on you anymore? If people didn't cry, I think they'd..." Shouto remembers himself, and it takes all he has not to cringe at who he had been, before the Sports Festival, before _Midoriya_. Zuko would have looked disappointed, and Shouto's sure of that, even if he had only talked to the teenager for a few minutes. "I think they'd freeze up. They'd stop being human. They wouldn't be worthy of being a hero, because if a hero doesn't cry, how else will he know how somebody in distress feels? A hero is a human, too, Midoriya." Shouto says, hoping that his words will reach his friend.

Midoriya's eyes grow teary, and tears stream down his cheeks. 

"You should cry if you feel like it. You're still human and you still deserve to feel hurt at whatever's hurt you." Shouto finishes, determinedly. 

Midoriya lets out a little hiccup. "T-Todoroki-kun?"

"Yes?" Shouto asks, hesitant.

Midoriya's smile is iridescent. "You're..." He rubs his nose impatiently, smiling wider even though tears are cascading down his cheeks. "You're the best friend a person could have ever asked for. I-I'm," Midoriya hiccups again, and Shouto feels _warm_. "I'm happy I met you." 

Iida sniffs too and Shouto smiles at Midoriya.

_I'm really glad I met you, too, Midoriya._

_I'm happy I can make you feel that way._

"No problem." Shouto says instead, knowing Midoriya'll understand.

And by that beautiful smile on his best friend's face, Shouto knows Midoriya did.


End file.
